Well, someone needs to stir the pot, because if you don’t the stew will burn!

I love the Stockholm Syndrome analogy. It is so Idaho. The Idaho Bar is dancing with their abusers because if they don’t, they won’t survive. The ones who speak out are abused some more.

As an every day citizen, I saw this bar rating poll disclosure that suddenly appeared right before the debate as a really sleaszy political move. Maybe,the Courts/Media Judicial Committee Members should stay out of the political campaign process? Maybe Judge Burdick should address that issue in their next meeting that we really don’t know if there is/will be one scheduled or not.

For instance why isn’t Brad Iverson-Long, who wrote this article on that committee?

Another point, these polls are only important if they are responded to by people who have actual experience with the particular person and if they themselves are competent. Any one should question how many of the poll responders have any real knowledge of the judges in question.

Lawyers like to express warm feelings for those who have power over them. It is a sort of hero worship, or worse, a desire to identify with the agressor. Recall the Stockholm Syndrome. One can imagine the warm feelings a lawyer had when he or she checked the box for a person tried and true as opposed to the box of a person from where was it Grangeville, Lewiston, someplace in the hustings.

The bottom line is this: The Bar knows you will go with the poll. The Bar loves its own. The Bar does not like people who stir the pot, no matter how smart and decent and concerned the person is.

This from a lawyer of 39 years experience.